Brothers and Bartenders
by Giacinta
Summary: Two unusual visitors turn up in Quark's Bar. Although this story mentions Deep Space Nine, it is a story about Sam and Dean, so I prefer posting it here. I have now added a second chapter. The brothers are still on the Space Station. You would really have to read Chapter One first to understand the story.
1. Chapter 1

The garish bar pulsed with a myriad of colours, the diversity of the alien life-forms contributing to the bizarre ensemble that was Quark's Bar; a bizarre ensemble that was perfectly normal to the inhabitants and visitors of the Ferengi's establishment, and of the space station now designated with the name of Deep Space Nine.

:

The once Terok Nor, an ex-Cardassian dilapidated mining-ore facility on the rim of known-space, was now a busy port of call for traders, scientists, explorers and just the plain curious, who, jaded by the paradisiacal boredom of Earth and the older Federation worlds, were attracted by the chaos, danger and lure of the unknown, and of the opportunity to gain fame and fortune.

:

The discovery of a stable wormhole leading to the unexplored Gamma Quadrant had given the station a new lease of life and in consequence, elevated the previously unimportant planet Bajor to a m:ajor player in Federation politics.

DS9 was a haven for all of the afore-mentioned, but sometimes, just sometimes, the unexpected would rear its head and stand out amongst the motley beings that graced Quark's establishment.

:

When the two humans entered, many heads, female, male and androgynous turned towards them, some because of the handsomeness of their features, others because of the old-fashioned cut of their clothes and others again out of the natural curiosity that arises when strangers walk into a room.

They made their way to the counter and settled down, shoulder to shoulder, giving Quark the unequivocal certainty that these two never wandered very far the one from the other.

:

He closed the few steps to where the two were sitting and launched into his standard refrain, "Welcome to Quark's. What can I get you, hu-mans?"

The shorter of the two lifted his eyes and the Ferengi felt a rare uneasiness permeate him as he encountered them. The green eyes were old, very old, belying the young, attractive, athletic body housing them.

"You got Earth beer?" a husky voice enquired calmly.

"Quark's prides itself on catering to all the needs of its clientele." The Ferengi leaned in closer and lowered his voice. "So if you need anything shall we say, a little particular…"

"Is that so?" replied the human with a smirk. "But I think we'll settle for the beers. I doubt you have anything so "particular" that it could surprise me."

:

Quark's attention turned to green eyes' companion.

"How about you? My holosuites have some of the most entertaining programmes in the entire quadrant. There's plenty to interest a strapping young hu-man like yourself."

The young man's wide eyes caught his own and once again the Ferengi was taken aback by the sensation of gazing into two ancient pools, completely at odds with the youthfulness of the body they were encased in.

"Maybe some other time. Right now we're fine with just the beers, thanks," a soft voice replied.

The bartender found it difficult to pull his gaze away from the curiously mesmerising eyes of the youth, when an amused snort from the other man pulled him from his reverie.

:

"Sammy," he heard him say, "Keep those puppy-eyes under control."

"I don't do it on purpose, Dean," was the huffed reply.

"I know, Sammy, I know!"

:

As Quark fetched the beers, he wondered just whom he had seated at his bar. Whoever they were, they weren't your usual run-of-the-mill hu-mans.

He was a businessman, not given to flights of fantasy, but there was something unique about these two, and his natural curiosity had been tickled.

:

"So, you gents here on business or just passing through?" he asked, coming back with the beers.

"Well it's really none of YOUR business, but for the sake of intergalactic good relations, I'll just say we're taking a little pleasure trip.

Sammy here, has been pestering me about coming to see the stable wormhole everyone's talking about and so to keep him from driving me mad, I decided to make a little detour to satisfy his curiosity, in the hope that he'll stop his bitching," Green eyes finished with an infectious smirk, turning his head towards "Sammy" who repaid him with a series of intriguing facial expressions and the word, "Jerk!"

:

"Do you know when the wormhole will be activated?" Sam asked.

"There's a Bolian ship due through from the Gamma Quadrant in a few minutes. If you want to see the wormhole opening, you'll get a good view from the upper level of the bar" Quark volunteered.

"Come on, Dean. I don't want to miss it!" The younger man's face suddenly illuminated itself with anticipation.

"There, you see what I've got to put up with?" was the answering reply, but it contained no censure just amusement for the puppy-like enthusiasm of his brother.

:

"I should have seen it right away," Quark mused to himself, "That they couldn't have been anything else but brothers."

He shook his head as he contemplated his own "pain in the ass" brother Rom and he softened towards the plight of the elder of the two siblings who were now making their way up the steps to the observation deck, beers in hand.

He continued to watch them as they stationed themselves next to the large oval window, their eyes glued to the panorama of the stars twinkling in the blackness of space.

Suddenly with an unexpected cascade of blues, pinks and violets the wormhole opened up in all its breathtaking glory allowing the Bolian ship access into the Alpha system.

:

The two brothers watched hypnotised as the colours erupted and then disappeared, leaving only the blackness of space once more.

"Oh God, Dean, have you ever seen anything so beautiful?" Sam's eyes were shiny with emotion and wonder.

Dean was moved by his brother's reaction. He'd thought that with the passing of the centuries, they'd seen and done everything, but he was wrong. There were still wonders lying in wait for the Winchesters and he was going to make sure his little brother got to experience them all.

:

"So, was it worth it to drag my ass out to the back of beyond just for this?" Dean joked.

"Shut up, Dean!" was the huffed reply. "You can act the 'been everywhere, seen it all' role if you like, but I know that you were just as moved as me by the wormhole."

"Can't get anything by you anymore, Sasquatch, can I?" was the fond rejoinder.

:

"Okay, Sam. What do you say if we fraternise with the inhabitants of DS9 for a few days. Maybe hustle some Latinum. I see the Bar has a Dabo table complete with hot chicks, and I think I saw a dart-board too.  
>Afterwards, bro, there's nothing to stop us taking the Impala and flying ourselves through that inviting wormhole and checking out what's on the other side," Dean grinned.<p>

"Great minds think alike!" Sam replied, his hazel eyes brimming with eagerness to explore new wonders.

"You got it, bitch!"

"You better believe it, Jerk!" was the affectionate reply.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter two

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Sam was blabbing on enthusiastically about the beauty of the wormhole while Dean just sat, stared into space and listened, marvelling at the ability of his little brother to still find awe in the sights and sensations of their daily life.

Three hundred years were a long time to live, and pretty well everything that there was to see or do, the Winchesters had seen and done.

:

When Humanity had moved into Space and individual space vessels had become as normal as cars had once been, the brothers had simply adapted to the times.

The Impala had given up the ghost after supplying the Winchesters with shelter and faithful service for many years, but Dean had kept many bits and pieces of his original Baby, incorporating them into subsequent vehicles.

The little army man and the Lego bricks took pride of place in their latest ride, as did the original dashboard and cassette player, and of course Dean's tapes. They were no longer functional but they were a reminder of what had been.

Now they had a state-of-the-art runabout, sleek and black like the original Impala and like her, Dean's pride and joy. She no longer roamed the back roads of America, but the space lanes of the Federation and not only, detouring wherever the Winchesters took a fancy to go.

Dean regretted that he couldn't open the windows and feel the air on his face any more, but the velocity of his ship compensated a little for that loss.

:

:

".. and the colours were so radiant swirling around like a multi-coloured whirlpool," Sam was saying as Dean's attention focused back on his brother's words.

"Okay, Sammy. I'll admit it was astounding but just how long are you gonna continue?" he eye-rolled his brother.

"We'll stay hereon the space station for as long as we want and then you'll get to have the full ride as we take the Impala through, although I hate to think of my poor ears then," he finished off with a grin.

"Right," Sam continued, eyes lighting up with interest." Before we go we're gonna have to get all the info possible. We don't want any nasty surprises along the way."

"Well, that's what I keep you around for, Sasquatch. Go make love to your computer while I go and get some Bar info and investigate the game they're playing over there at the Dabo table. "

"The fact that there's a fantastic looking girl directing the play has nothing to do with your sudden interest in the game, naturally," Sam smirked.

"You wound me little brother. You know my interest is purely professional, don't you?"

"Of course I do Dean, of course I do," Sam scoffed, accessing the Station's computer using his own paper-thin Padd.

:

What a strange life they led, Dean mused sauntering over to the Dabo table; not that it hadn't been strange from the very beginning! But now!

When he had been thirty-four and Sam had been coming up for thirty, only God if he's still about, knows what happened. The fact is he and Sam just never got any older.

While at first it was great, they were always in splendid form, their bodies remaining young and at the height of their strength, but then as the years started to pass rapidly and the few acquaintances they still had aged and died, it didn't seem so cool any more.

:

They had no idea why this was.

Both he and his brother had died many times upsetting the natural order, and perhaps the powers that be had decided to punish them with eternal life for their insolence in not staying dead when they should have.

He and Sam had to have really pissed off someone big-time, for this Highlander wannabe thing sucked, though at least they weren't expected to carry three foot long swords about with them!

Would they ever die, he wondered?

:

He stopped for a second and looked back at Sam who was immersed in his reading, and smiled.

Ultimately it was six or half a dozen; Heaven, Hell or Eternal Life, as long as he and his pain-in-the-ass little brother were together, it didn't really matter at all!

:

He continued on towards the table.

Sam was right; the Dabo girl was really beautiful. She had the nose ridges typical of the Bajorans but they only enhanced her looks.

In over three hundred years, Dean had seen all kinds and had enjoyed one night stands with a variety of alien females, but he was a traditionalist at heart and the human-like women were still the ones that attracted him the most.

"Would you like to join the game, sir?" she smiled invitingly as he stood by watching the betting.

"I'd love to," he replied, as he gave her his most engaging smile "But I have to admit that I've never actually played before. Poker's more my poison."

"Don't worry," she answered gaily ogling his handsome features and firm body, "It's not in the least bit difficult." And neither it was.

It was just a glorified Roulette and in fact Dean had no trouble taking big wins from the house.

"Well," she commented." It's a good job you didn't know how to play. Quark would have gone bankrupt if you did."

"Beginner's luck," Dean smirked gathering his winnings and making his way back to his brother, his hands full of strips of gold-plated latinum.

:

"I see the Dabo table surrendered its secrets to you, Dude," Sam grinned.

Dean sat down and showered his winnings onto the table.

"After three hundred and thirty-four years of hustling, well just about everything; it won't be a glorified roulette that'll stop me, Sammy!" replied his big brother smugly.

Did you find out anything interesting in the Station's logs, Geek boy?"

"Well, yeah. It seems that smack in the centre of the wormhole lives a race of aliens which the Bajorans worship as Gods. They call them the Prophets."

"Great, more Gods! That's all we need." Dean bitched.

"Other ships go through without any bother so I don't think we'll have anything to worry about, Dean," Sam observed.

"Huh, I'll be convinced of that when we're safely through to the Gamma Quadrant. Prophets! The very word gives me a bad feeling!"

:

Outwardly Sam was calm but in his heart he was just as wary as Dean of anything vaguely God or Prophet–like, but he was dying to experience the sensation of passing through the amazing Wormhole.

They would just have to be careful when they did decide to go!

Sam had always believed there had to be a purpose to their situation. Surely somewhere in this vast universe they would find an answer.

:

The End (for now)


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

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Sam could feel the excitement mounting.

He and Dean had taken their seats in the Impala's cock-pit, the thick titanium doors of the air-lock rolling into place and effectively cutting them off from the space-station.

Dean, so attuned now to his sibling's emotions, elbowed him.

"Hey there, Sparky. Calm down! A freaky worm-hole's not anything we haven't seen before."

Sam gave him the familiar bitch-face that had kept Dean company for centuries now, but which the elder Winchester never tired of being on the receiving end of. It meant Sam was alive and by his side and if nothing interrupted their on-going longevity, it would continue to amuse him forever.

:

"We _**haven't **_seen one before, Dean! Not one that opens and closes with such precision and show of special effects. And we're gonna fly through it." He caught his brother's eye. "Aren't you just a little bit excited?"

Dean shrugged." I'm not going to deny it's cute but so are the women I got to know on Deep Space Nine. Dude, that plant-girl from Floralia was something else! It wasn't just her face that was surrounded by petals, so was her p..."

"Shut up, Dean! I don't want to know, okay! I didn't want to know about your one night stands back when we were just plain Sam and Dean, but now that we're Methuselahs, I've had enough of 'Dean Winchester's Amorous Adventures Through Time and Space!"

"Dude," Dean huffed. "You're the weird one, you might be a Methuselah but you still act like a pissy little kid."

:

He turned his attention to the pre-flight checks.

Dean always kept the little black ship in tip-top condition, having gradually incorporated all the relevant engineering through the years as space-travel evolved and the human race took to the sky.

Now roaming the space-lanes was no different to driving down a black-top, though the Winchesters were probably the only humans alive who could actually say they'd lived those days.

Satisfied with the state of the Impala, Dean punched in the coordinates and the little craft jumped to obey his orders, making a bee-line for the worm-hole which was due to open in fifteen minutes.

:

Space engineering wasn't all the Winchesters had majored in through the years.

Sam had mastered an impressive array of alien languages and codes, his geeky brain absorbing information like a sponge, while Dean, though no slouch himself in the research department, had preferred to dedicate himself to picking up all the new fighting techniques and game skills that had been added to humanity's sports.

Though there was no longer any need on Earth nor on the Earth colonies for money, people still loved to wager on games of skill and Dean had taken to Parrises Squares like a duck to water.

The times he came back from a game bruised and battered but triumphant, Sam would just roll his eyes and listen to Dean's moment by moment replay with good natured patience!

:

:

As the Impala approached the opening site, Dean could feel the anticipation radiating from Sam, and he chuckled.

His little brother was nothing if not constant, as curious now as he ever was, and Dean mused, just as stubborn. Once he got the bit between his teeth, there was no stopping him. He'd dragged Dean to this backwaters station on the edge of known space just to see this worm-hole.

He'd been told by traders on DS9 that going through was a hell of a roller-coaster ride, and despite what he'd said to Sam, he did feel a thrill at the idea.

On the other side lay a unknown quadrant to explore and surely there would be a whole new set of supernatural fuglies to take out. Each planet had its own version of vampires, were-wolves, etc.

The research kept Sam happy and the hunt still sent a tingle though Dean even though the adrenaline rush was toned down by the whole immortality crap. On the plus side, he didn't have to worry about something taking Sam out, and of himself having to end the world to get him back. So win-win!

:

When the worm-hole opened in a riot of pinks, reds, and azures, the brothers' breath hitched in wonder, the donut-shaped Deep Space Nine hanging in the blackness of space at their backs, forgotten.

"Dean;" Sam gasped. " Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?"

"Well the Grand Canyon wasn't so bad, " Dean declared not wanting to admit his own awe at the phenomenon that now occupied the entire space in front of the ship.

:

He glanced over at his brother.

"Ready Sammy?"

"Go, man!"

"Hold on to your panties and get ready for a roller-coaster ride, " Dean grinned pushing the Impala forward into the mouth of the singularity.

"Woo-hoo! " he yelled as the Impala began bouncing like a bucking bronco.

"Dean.. ..." Sam's voice dripped with disapproval. "Up the stabilizers or I won't be responsible for decorating the cock-pit with puke!"

"You sure know how to ruin a guy's fun, " Dean bitched but before long the Impala was scudding along in its usual smooth fashion.

"Happy now, Francis?"

:

Sam rolled his eyes but that's as far as he got before the multicoloured pulsing walls of the worm-hole disappeared along with the metal confines of the Impala, and he found himself gazing mesmerised at Jess' beautiful face.

"Sam."

"Jess?" Sam made a super-human effort to drag his eyes from her face and take a look around. He was standing in the flat they'd shared at Stanford but at the edges of his vision he caught sight of a hazy grey mist.

Wherever he was, it wasn't Stanford.

:

Dean!

"Dean, where are you? " he yelled.

"Your brother is well, " Jess' soothing voice assured him. "You will see him soon. He is being informed as you are."

"What is this place?

Sam had no fear of this apparition, just of being separated from his brother.

"We live within the worm-hole," false Jess explained. "We were waiting for you."

:

In his over three centuries of life, Sam had almost forgotten what surprise felt like, but the being's words reminded him.

"Waiting for us?" Sam repeated dazed. "But why?"

"We were taught by another human that your race lives in a linear dimension. We do not. We are timeless. There is no past nor future, only now. You and your brother are a new breed. You live in a linear world, yet you are timeless. Your very existence interferes with the correct working of the universe."

:

Sam mulled over her words for a minute before asking.

"What do you want us to do? We didn't ask to be like this, you should take it up with the dicks that made the mess in the first place.."

The Jess clone smiled, causing Sam's heart to clench at the memory of his long dead girl-friend.

"No-one wants to harm you, or wishes your dead, but the time has come to choose. We have been authorized to restore your humanity and the death that comes with it or if you prefer, you may pass on."

"Pass on?" Sam frowned.

"Become two amongst the most powerful beings in the universe, those who call themselves the 'Q'. Their number has diminished and they would welcome new vigorous blood such as you and your brother, two humans who have chosen to retain their moral integrity through the centuries when they could easily have chosen to travel the road to evil."

:

Just then the grey mists wavered and Dean appeared, flanked on either side by simulacra of John and Mary Winchester.

Sam's heart missed a beat. His brain knew they were as false as Jess but they looked so real, John tall and solid, Mary as beautiful as ever.

:

"Sam," Dean yelled, running towards him. "You okay?"

"I'm fine, Dean!" Sam assured his big brother.

Dean nodded, then caught sight of the Jess clone.

"Little brother, I still ask myself how you managed to snag a hot chick like her. Gotta hand it to you, dude."

"So did she feed you the company line?" he continued serious now.

"Yeah. They want us to choose, humanity or ..."

:

Around them the beings retreated leaving them alone in the once Stanford flat.

"You're the college boy, Sammy. Come up with an answer."

"Oh, no. You're not going to put this on me. We decide together," Sam declared.

:

Dean clicked his tongue.

"Okaaay...the choice is between an all-powerful 'Q' or growing old, dying and passing the rest of our existence in dick heaven or dick hell."

"But," Sam asked confused. "If we can be made to die now, why couldn't we die before?"

"Maybe we had to walk the Kung-Fu path to enlightenment or some crap like that! _**I**_ don't know Sammy."

"Maybe," Sam agreed thoughtfully.

"Hey, we could try for a suspension. Do we have to decide right now? Maybe we could keep them hanging on for another century or two. They're timeless beings after all," Dean suggested.

"We can try, but if they insist we decide right now, Dean?"

"Sam, a choice between growing old and dying, versus promotion to all-powerful 'Q' is no choice at all. 'All-powerful' means just that. I get to do anything; go anywhere I want; … ruffle that girlie hair of yours through time and space; hop from planet to planet. Dude! Awesome!"

:

Sam huffed. An all-powerful Dean was the stuff of nightmares, at least as far a pranking went, though Sam was surprised to find that was practically his only negative!  
>:<p>

"Yeah, okay, " Sam agreed. "We try for an adjournment to think it through, but failing that we go for the 'Q' stuff."

Dean clapped him on the back.

"I got the utmost faith in you, lawyer boy, " he grinned.

:

He didn't know exactly what Sam did, though he wasn't ready to cross off the puppy-powers of Sam's eyes, which had upped their mesmerizing effect through the years.

Well he'd had plenty of time to practise, mostly on his elder brother, Dean reflected ruefully.

:

"So how long do we get," Dean asked, magically finding himself back in the Impala, the glorious riot of colours surrounding them once more.

"They said we'd be contacted personally by a 'Q' sometime in the future."

"That's my boy," Dean smirked, stretching over to give his sibling's head a fond slap. "We've got lots to do before we become all powerful!"

Sam didn't bother answering, just rolled his eyes!

:

The End.


End file.
